Workers Solidarity Movement

You thought that equal pay had been sorted years ago? Well, according to the United Nations, women and girls do two thirds of the world’s work for 5% of the income. Of the world’s 550 million working poor, those unable to lift themselves and their families above the $1 per day threshold, 330 million, or 60%, are women.

Just 1% of the population owns 34% of the wealth in the 26 counties (excluding the value of residential housing). That’s according to the Bank of Ireland report ‘The Wealth of the Nation’.

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May saw absolutely no job losses announced. May was also the month of the Dail election. Did Fianna Fail ask their business pals to hold off any bad news? In June things got back to ‘normal’ with job losses at Eircom, Dell, Lapple, Wrapite, Molex, the ESB and Hovid.

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For the past eight years the people of Rossport in North West Mayo have been struggling against an at- tempt by Shell and other companies to build a dangerous and destructive gas processing terminal near to their homes and their community. This development would benefit no-one but wealthy shareholders as the Irish Government handed over the extraction rights to the oil companies in the 1980s and 1990s.

The boss is shown the door and the workers take over. That’s what happened for a month at Reilly Bookbinders on the Murrough Industrial Estate in Wicklow town.The company had been in Wicklow for 30 years. Then four years ago it was taken over by Dunne and Wilson (Ireland) Ltd.. Two years later the building from which the company operated was sold to the Wicklow Enterprise Centre for over €900,000. It is understood to have been acquired by Dunne and Wilson for between €400,000 and €450,000. Then, this summer, boss Richard Geraghty told staff that the lease was up on August 1st and their work was being relocated to the Czech Republic.

The debate has started. One of the ESB unions, Unite-Amicus, wants the government to build nuclear power stations. We are told that it’s a “clean technology” that will reduce climate change.

The July/August 2007 issue of Workers Solidarity is now online and can be downloaded as a PDF file.
 

Would you accept a job without signing a proper legal contract? A job that means working long days for 400 euro a month doing chores like ironing, cooking, laundering, cleaning a 4 bed house and even mean babysitting four children aged between two and seven years old?

Terence Wheelock’s death is by no means extraordinary, in that his death was one twenty two deaths reported in Garda Custody since 1997. Of these figures, a majority of those who died are under the age of thirty, and, in the case of Brian Rossiter, the victim was just fourteen years old.

Lucy Parsons Newsletter Issue One Summer 2007

Domestic workers in Ireland
Would you accept a job without signing a proper legal contract? A job that means working long days for 400 euro a month doing chores like ironing, cooking, laundering, cleaning a 4 bed house and even mean babysitting four children aged between two and seven years old?

In 1941 a bill was brought before the Dail which would make trade unions pay for licences to negotiate on behalf of their members. Without a licence workers and their unions could be sued by employers for loss of profits if they went on strike. This blatant attempt at extorting money from unions was not taken well. The Dublin Trades’ Council, representing 60,000 workers, called the bill ‘a partisan attack on the working classes’. The Irish Women Workers Union urged opposition to the bill and on June 4th 100 shop stewards endorsed their union’s stand.